351CJ

"Sharon K.Cooke" <scooke@cox.net> wrote in message
news:43F2A9D1.4539A218@cox.net...
> 351CJ wrote:
>>
>> "Sharon K.Cooke" <scooke@cox.net> wrote in message
>> news:43F2303A.7ECB61AD@cox.net...
>> > ncrocket wrote:
>> >>
>> >> The other day my oil pressure game went to low. and you can tell it's
>> >> not getting oil because you an here it in the motor. Sometimes when i
>> >> first start up the truck it had oil pressure just fine. After driving
>> >> for 10 or so minutes it drops to nothing. But if i shut off the truck
>> >> and start it back up it goes right back to normal.
>> >
>> > I'm not sure just when Ford went from a "real" oil pressure gauge to a
>> > idiot
>> > light with an analog readout, but it probably was late 80s for the
>> > truck
>> > lines.
>> > If there's a button type sender at the oil pressure output port, it's a
>> > fake
>> > gauge that closes a switch around 7 psi and then reopens it at say, 5
>> > psi.
>> > Put a
>> > mechanical gauge on the oil pressure port and see if the readings are
>> > consistent
>> > with the factory "gauge". If so, you have problems, ranging from a
>> > dirty
>> > sump
>> > (oil pickup screen gets clogged) to worn main bearings or crankshaft.
>> > If
>> > not,
>> > it's the gauge itself, the sender, or the sender wiring.
>>
>> Since the late 60's at least, '71 for sure.
>
> No, they had idiot lights back in 1949 or so; I'm talking about the fake
> gauge
> that's driven by an on-off switch like the idiot light, but appears to be
> an
> actual needle-type gauge. That piece of trickery didn't happen until the
> late
> 1980s on Ford trucks, and Ford-made cars with apparent gauges in the early
> 1990s.

Well I have an '82 pickup or bronco, or an 89 pickup, take your pick, with a
factory idiot GAUGE, not the light! If you need a picture the gauge and
it's sending unit, I'll gladly post if on a binary Usenet group for you. I
don't have my 71 truck anymore, The oil pressure gauge in that one may have
been after market.